Earlier this week Vestas, the controversial wind energy company based in Denmark, announced it would lay off 1,400 workers in the “Americas”. The company declined to say whether the layoffs would affect workers in Colorado.
According to the Pueblo Chieftain:
“The news came as the political fight over the stalled federal wind power tax credit builds like a storm. The Republican Party's policy committee ignored the wind credit in drafting a platform for next week's national GOP convention in Tampa, Fla. That's because Mitt Romney, the GOP presidential contender, opposes it — a stand President Barack Obama is attacking in advertisements in Colorado and other states with wind power manufacturers.”
The wind credit was not included in the Republican platform because anyone specifically opposes it, it wasn’t included because the wind energy simply can’t stand on its own without massive government subsidies, which is the definition of boondoggle. As we pointed out earlier this year, in 2010, wind energy subsidies per kilowatt hour came to $56.29.
Even worse, instead of the Obama Administration using money for further research and development (i.e., to help make this technology work without massive government subsidies), Obama “blew” $500,000 in stimulus funds (read: your hard-earned dollars) paid to Democratic PR firm, McNeely Pigott & Fox Public Relations, to run ads on the less than fair and balanced, MSNBC, touting its green job training program. The ads, specifically, ran on “The Rachel Maddow Show” and the now-defunct “Countdown with Keith Olbermann”.
“It's unclear how many people might have gotten involved in the green job training program because of the ads. But in terms of direct economic impact, the official online entry on the contract listed zero jobs created as a result of the payment," wrote FoxNews.com
Fox News also reports that Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) plans to write a letter to the Labor Department seeking additional information about the contract and “complained that the federal government already spends ‘way too much’ on advertising as it is.”
The Labor Department contract’s “award summary” explained that the ads were meant for "raising awareness among employers and influencers" about the green jobs program and to compel a "target audience" to contact the Job Corps Call Center to ask about enrolling.
Only the federal government would see the need to make people aware of a jobs program in the middle of the highest and most prolonged unemployment in decades. Just another day in the wastefulness of our federal government. We'd bet that those unemployed in Colorado would have been happy to put that money toward actually creating new jobs.
Do your calculations of subsidies for oil and gas include the 70% deduction (in the first year) of the cost of drilling a well as "intangible drilling costs?" And do they include the exemption of both industries from the clean air and clean water acts? And do they include the public cost of the interstate highway system on which most of their products are consumed, or the public cost of all airports (municipally funded typically) on which planes consuming jet fuel land? Do your costs of subsidies to coal include the avoided costs for air and water pollution from simple non-enforcement of existing laws. Or the costs of thousands of deaths per year from particulate matter emitted from coal-fired electric plants?